Chinese netizens talk back to President Hu Jintao’s moral campaign

President Hu Jintao’s “socialist concept of honor and disgrace” moral campaign is in full swing nationwide, and Chinese netizens are responding online.

Hu’s new moral code is:

1) The honor of loving the motherland ; the disgrace of endangering the motherland

2) The honor of serving the people; the disgrace of turning away from the people

3) The honor of upholding science; the disgrace of ignorance and illiteracy

4) The honor of industrious labor; the disgrace of indolence

5) The honor of togetherness and cooperation; the disgrace of profiting at the expense of others

6) The honor of honesty and keeping one’s word; the disgrace of abandoning morality for profit

7) The honor of discipline and obedience; the disgrace of lawlessness and disorder

8) The honor of striving arduously; the disgrace of wallowing in luxury

Here is one anonymous netizen’s comment on schools forcing students to write about the campaign, posted on Baidu’s instant keyword BBS (link) (translated by CDT):

Boss, do you really know? Students from universities, high schools and grads schools, public or private, all over the country, are in hell. All because you moved your lips. Those “reflection” papers [that students are forced to write about the campaign], “implementation” plans, etc… overwhelmed with this kind of homework, nowhere to run. Your portrait and eight honor and disgrace slogans are on every wall in several layers over. As for the substance of your talk? I actually think it is non-sense.

In the meantime, blogger Sangedaibiao has posted the following comments on his Massage Milk blog (translated by CDT):

Eight honors, eight disgraces has now become the standard for socialist spiritual civilization.

Isn’t this standard way too low?

More than one thousand years ago, on an autumn day, an old man said at the Yueyang building, “I will worry about life before everyone else under heaven; I will enjoy life after everyone else under heaven.”

Several centuries ago, Gu Yanwu also said “If the nation is to rise or fall, the individual has a responsibility.”

Even twenty some years ago, students at Peking University shouted “Unite for the rise of China.”

So there is plenty of heritage from our ancestors to learn from. Now with the “socialist concept of honor and disgrace,” I can only guess it must be: